Love and Brimstone

Chapter Twenty-Two

Matthias’ voice came to her from a long, shadowy hallway.

“Anastazia.”

She searched for him, knowing he was there, wanting to find him, needing him.

“Here.”

In her mind she turned and found him behind her. Taz opened her eyes, and Matthias smiled down at her, propped on one elbow in their bed. She started to speak, but he gently put a finger to her lips, then replaced it with his mouth.

“My love.”

Her eyes widened.

She could hear his thoughts. Without effort. It wasn’t a dream.

Her fingers trailed along his neck where she’d bit him. Chewed on him it felt like, but there wasn’t a mark, not even a bruise.

“Yes, it happened,” he spoke aloud.

She looked at him then kissed him. Her hands traveled below his waist and wrapped around his cock. He instantly responded by stiffening in her hand and rolling on top of her. She gasped as his cock easily slid in, filling her pussy. She threw her legs around him and thrust to meet him.

Reaching out with her mind, Matthias met her in the shadowy hall of their passion. It wasn’t quite six in the morning, but she wanted to spend all day in bed with him. Every stroke of his cock inside her hit her clit perfectly, in a way no other man ever had. She pushed the cliché out of her mind, enjoying having her brains fucked out.

Do this for the rest of her life? Hell, yes.

At one point she rolled on top of him, slowing their tempo to a steady, sultry rhythm while his fingers slipped between her legs and his thumb drew tight, sensual circles around her clit. When she came, he rolled on top of her and picked up speed, thrusting his cock deep and hard into her, his eyes boring into hers—

“I love you, Anastazia.”

—and she smiled.

“Take me, big guy,” she whispered. With another hard thrust he came, collapsing on her, his body trembling.

She wrapped her arms around him, and they slept again.

The knock on the door almost sounded polite. “Matthias, Anastazia, are you all right?” Albert managed to sound concerned and amused at the same time. Matthias lifted his head and glanced at the clock. “Oh hell,” he whispered. “It’s after eight.”

“They’re hungry.”

They both giggled. He kissed her, rolling off her.

“We’re okay, Albert,” he called out. “I’m sorry we overslept. Go ahead. We’ll meet you at breakfast.”

“Very well.”

She wrapped her arms around Matthias. “Not if I have my way,” she whispered in his ear.

He responded then pulled away. “We have to eat. Come on, let’s see how many vampires can fit in a phone booth.”

The shower was a tight squeeze. It wasn’t made for two, but they had fun trying. They held hands as they walked into the dining room. She watched Albert and Robertson exchange smiles.

“Fine, say I told you so and get it over with,” she snarked as Matthias pulled out her chair for her.

“Taz,” Robertson said, “I prefer not to. I’m just glad the war is over.”

She felt hungry, starving, ravenous. The food looked and tasted great, better than it had any other day. Colors and aromas were even more vivid. She paused at one point, her forkful of eggs halfway up to her mouth, and looked across the table at Matthias.

He smiled, watching her, his elbows on the table, hands clasped, food untouched.

“What?”

The other men watched her. She’d plowed through half her breakfast like a starving linebacker, and they hadn’t touched theirs yet. “What?” she said again, trying to control her irritation.

Matthias shook his head. “Nothing, dearest. You seem to have quite the appetite this morning.”

She nodded. “I feel like I haven’t eaten in a week.”

Albert and Matthias exchanged amused looks. Taz put her fork down. “Spill it. Come on, I’m tired of this. Next thing you know you guys will be trying to spell things behind my back.”

Matthias reached across the table and touched her hand as he looked into her eyes.

“We’ll talk after breakfast, Anastazia.”

She heard him clearly then looked at the others. They were now eating and hadn’t heard him.

She looked at Matthias, and he smiled. “Oh, the talks we can have, Anastazia.”

“Who said I want to talk?”

He grinned and grabbed his fork. “That too, my love.”

“Especially now, so early in the learning process, you are expending a lot of energy,” he explained as they walked, hand in hand, to the car. “If you didn’t eat, I’d be very worried because you would literally burn yourself out. It would kill you. Eventually, you’ll get to a point where it doesn’t exhaust you so much or make you so ravenous once you learn to control it.”

“I won’t end up looking like a friggin’ buffalo, will I?”

He smiled and pulled her to him, kissing her. “No chance of that, cara.” He ran his hands down to her backside, seductively grinding his hips against hers. “You are beautiful, perfection. Built like a woman should be.”

She wrapped her arms around him, gasping at the feel of his breath in her ear and his hard bulge pressing against her.

“That is what you do to me, Taz. That’s what you’ve done to me from the first time I laid eyes on you.” He finally released her, leaving her dizzy and breathing heavy, and helped her into the Rover.

He wouldn’t tell her where they were going and wouldn’t let her read his mind. She suspected she could force her way in, but she didn’t want to.

They headed east, alone. He pulled into the parking lot at West Thumb Geyser Basin and led her down the boardwalk to the lakeside. There were only a few scattered tourists, most enthralled by the features like Abyss Pool, Fishing Cone, or the paint pots. Matthias wanted to show her the lake.

There was a handrail at one section. He stood behind her and placed his hands over hers on top of it. She tried not to think about how the bulge now pressed against her lower back felt when he was inside her.

“Concentrate, Taz,” he silently teased.

“What do you want me to do?”

There wasn’t anyone close enough to hear them. “Look at the lake. Then I want you to close your eyes and see it in your mind.”

“Through your eyes? Like I did before?”

“No, through your mind. I don’t mean imagine it. I mean reach out with your mind and see it. Not through me.”

“How?”

“I can’t tell you that. Not that I don’t want to, but I don’t know how to tell you. I have a feeling there are things you can do that I can’t.”

That was a comfort.

Not.

She closed her eyes and felt his hands protectively covering hers on the handrail.

Leaning against him, she tried not to think about his warm breath on her neck. Instead, she tried to revisit the darkened room in her mind. She was two for two on imagery, so why screw with what worked?

He didn’t say or think anything, or else he was keeping his thoughts from her. She pictured the darkened room in her mind and walked over to the windows. The shades were drawn, but behind them it looked dark.

In her mind, she pictured a grey light dawning behind the shades. She reached out with both hands to raise the blinds.

Light fought its way through a thick, grey fog. How long would this take? She took a deep breath and smelled the lake, fish beneath the surface, and the sulfur from the hot springs behind them. The air felt cool, wet, like the lake, and even more than that. Blowing over the cold water from the east, she smelled things on the breeze from miles away, scents she couldn’t identify but instinctively knew bore down from the mountains beyond the lake, even perhaps from the Shoshone forest to the east.

Just like that, the fog lifted. In front of her lay the dark blue water of Yellowstone Lake with the Absaroka Range in stark relief on the far side to the east.

Matthias’ voice spoke in her mind. “Don’t open your eyes. Tell me what you see.”

Coherent thought escaped her. Just the shock of seeing the lake before her as a live image and not as a memory made her forget her purpose. She let her mind drift further. As with their session near Old Faithful, she was not just seeing out the windows but seeing the scene before her, only in her mind and not through Matthias’ eyes.

“There’s a yellow canoe to our left,” she whispered, “close to shore, with two people.”

“Good,” he murmured. “More. Let yourself float, like in a movie, an aerial view. Pan around with your mind.”

She did. It was amazing how easy it was once she tapped into it. She saw the two of them standing on the boardwalk, her head limp against Matthias’ shoulder. If not for him she’d be passed out on the boardwalk. Then she realized she couldn’t feel his body against her.

She raced over the parking area, the Land Rover, and saw a mule deer grazing by the path. She paused, and it looked up at her.

“Go,” she thought.

It bounded out of the parking area.

“Good,” he whispered in her ear. “Follow the road back to the cabins.”

She flew! Over cars, at the top of the trees, she raced across the landscape, amazed, astounded. Over the Continental Divide twice, through Craig Pass, and around to the valley where Old Faithful awaited.

And there she found Robertson and Albert, sitting in chairs outside the cabin, while Moe, Larry, and Curly quietly talked nearby. Robertson looked up sharply. Albert stopped talking, following his gaze.

“What is it, Tim?” he said.

“Anastazia,” Robertson said.

Matthias’ voice cut through the distance. “Come back to me.”

And like that, she was leaning against his shoulder, her knees weak. He caught her, scooped her up, and carried her to a nearby bench. She shivered. She was freezing despite the warm air. He draped his jacket around her shoulders, taking her hands in his, trying to warm them.

Something was wrong. The sun was in the wrong place. “How long have we been here?”

“Three hours,” he said. “I’m sorry I put you through that. I’m sorry we don’t have more time to ease you into this.”

She couldn’t stop shivering.

Matthias’ cell rang. Apparently annoyed at the interruption, he snapped it open. “Yes?”

Taz knew it was Albert. She heard him even though Matthias didn’t have the volume turned up loud.

He looked at her. “We’ll be back…”

Everything went dark.